The Plan
by CourtneyEllen
Summary: The plan was simple; get James and Lily together. By any means necessary.


For QLFC, I was given the prompt: Scorpio (October 23-November 21). Scorpios are constantly plotting several steps ahead in order to orchestrate an eventual checkmate. This doesn't mean their intentions are necessarily nefarious. **Write about a character(s) that seems conniving and manipulative but aren't bad people OR write about a character(s) that manipulate others for their own agendas, whether good or bad.**

**Word Count: **1,360

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The plan was simple; get James and Lily together. By any means necessary.

Sirius did not mean anything malicious by the teasing. He just wanted to help his best mate get the girl of his dreams.

It had first started when Sirius called Lily Evans a know-it-all in potions class. Sure, she was actually a know-it-all that did not know when to be quiet or to not raise her hand, but Sirius liked to keep those thoughts to himself. The comment had been worth the sneer from James and the smack from Remus while James quickly apologized for Sirius' comment and Lily smiled that warm smile that did not quite reach her eyes. A peculiar smile for a fourth year witch to have mastered.

(Sirius would find out years later that Lily had spent a good portion of her childhood hearing the biting insults from her sister Petunia and the comforting smile had actually been her mother's.)

That had been the first step in his plan to get James and Lily to go out with each other. The next phase was a lot more physical. Any time that he saw Lily in the corridors, he made it his mission to knock the books from her hand. Whether it was a 'accidental' bump or a forceful shove. Merlin, he even went right up to her and smacked the books from her hands and hurried off before she could retaliate against him. The first couple of times had been met with forced chuckles and wary smiles from James and outright displeasure and disappointment from Remus. Around Sirius' fourth time, James begun to shield Lily subtly so his mate would run into him instead of the female Gryffindor and the tenth saw James verbally lashing out at Sirius whenever he and Lily were in the same corridor at the same time.

Sirius had huffed and asked how James always knew and the raven haired man replied with "you had that nasty gleam in your eye" which only made Sirius grin and tease his friend more.

The twelfth time that Sirius had knocked Lily's books from her hands, James had slammed him against the stone wall, hand pressed tightly against his throat. Any smile that Sirius would have had on his face at the time gone.

"If you do not stop," James had growled out, his voice still a bit pitchy from being in the middle of puberty, as he held Sirius against the wall. Remus had appeared at James' side instantly, his face sunken and tired from the last full moon, but no less smug that James was now calling Sirius on his antics. Peter stood at James' other shoulder looking around in fear of professors popping up around the corner. Usually when one of them got in trouble, they all got in trouble.

"What do you mean, Jamesie?" Sirius, ever the jokester, had a grin on his lips as he snidely replied back. This was the best course of action to see the plan out. James, bless him, had never been the smartest book on the shelf and could not see that Sirius was doing this to help him. Before James could say anything more, a grating voice that they both loathed floated through the air.

"She doesn't need help from you Potter," Severus Snape was a spineless coward who thought he could win every argument if he used big enough words. Sirius hated him. James despised him because Snape was the one who could hang out with Lily, be the one to hold her books after Sirius knocked them down.

"No one asked for your opinion Snivellus," James' voice held all of the Pureblood haughtiness that the Gryffindor tried to push down as he made his way to Lily to start gathering her books. All five of them, the corridor now suspiciously empty, all jumped in surprise when a dainty hand reached out and smack James' hand away from the Ancient Runes book he had been about to grab.

"Go bother someone else, Potter!" Lily's voice, usually soft unless answering a question in class, was sharp and made Sirius shiver at the power behind it. He had seen Lily in charms and knew how fierce she could be, but he had never seen it manifested towards another person like this. The three marauders watched as James' face hardened and his eyes became stone cold. He scowled at the books and quickly stood back up.

"Suit yourself, Evans." With that he strutted away, the rest of the marauders on his heels. Sirius casted a quick glance back at Lily, now Evans, and scowled as Snivellus helped clean up her books. The plan was put on pause for the time being. It was no point attempting to get them together when all they did was fight back and forth. Remus had also managed to get the plan out of him and had been rather ashamed at Sirius' tactics to get a girl to like James. Remus also informed him that those tactics would probably only work if Lily had liked Sirius, which she did not.

The plan did not pick up against until after an incident in fifth year when Snape decided that Lily's friendship was worth calling her a 'Mudblood' over. James and Sirius both came from Pureblood families on different sides of the spectrum and had heard it all, but never had they flinched at the word the way they did when Snape spat it at Lily. James had attempted to comfort her after the incident, but Lily simply ran away and refused to talk to anyone. Now while the plan did not seem to be back in motion, without Snape around it was a lot easier to illustrate to Lily that James was perfect for her.

Sirius admits later that he had only been in the library to see if he could get into the restricted section and he had happened upon Lily in his sneaking. She was the only one in the library at this time of night (right before curfew since she would never break the rules) and was surrounded by a mound of books. Her red hair was pulled up into a messy bun and her head rested in her hands. Sirius could not see her face, but was willing to bet she looked tired.

"I'm no expert, believe me, but I think you have to actually have your eyes open to study," her head slowly moved up, her reaction time slow, and her eyes were narrowed when they connected with his.

"Leave me alone Black," she sighed tiredly, Sirius already having taken a seat before she was half-way through talking. He beamed at her, letting his dimples show 'innocently'. Oh, yes the plan was back on.

"What are you studying, Evans?" Sirius questioned, lifting up the abandoned book in front of her up so he could read the cover. Transfiguration, huh? He smiled inwardly as he began to plot in his head.

"The Vanishing spell?" He asked, remembering how frustrated some in the class had gotten when they could not get it first try. Sirius had always had an affinity for transfiguration, it came easily to him, same with Remus. James had done in on his second try, his family's magic old and strong.

"Yeah, I just can not seem to get it correct." Evans seemed too tired to keep up their year long feud tonight.

"Maybe James could help you? He has always been rather good at transfiguration, gets it from his mum," Sirius lied effortless, fifteen years of lying to his mother and wearing her 'Pureblood mask' working in his favor. Lily seemed to think it over for a minute before simply nodding her head in acceptance. Sirius left her after that, letting her make her own conclusions on the information he had just presented her.

Imagine his surprise five years later when Lily presented him with his godson, Harry. The cutest little boy there was. His existence had come about from a lie and whispered simple transfiguration facts, and almost no effort after that on Sirius' part. The plan had been a success.

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Sirius Black is a Scorpio and I took my chance! I hope you like it!


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